Prospectus  of  the  American 
Guano  Company 


[BRARY 


THE  UNIVERSITY 


OF  CALIFORNIA 


LOS  ANGELES 


PROSPECTUS 


ANO  COMPANY. 


N1-:\V  YORK: 
IS  F.  TROW    PRINTER,   53  ANN  STREET. 
1855. 


PROSPECTUS 


OF    THE 


AMERICAN 


GUANO  COMPANY. 


NEW  YORK: 

JOHN  F.  TROW    PRINTER,   53  ANN  STREET. 
1855, 


American  (Stoaiur 


President.  Vice-president. 

A.  G.  BENSON.  BEETRAM  IT.  HOWELL. 

Trustees. 

GEORGE  W.  BEEBEE,  Tiros.  G.  TALMAGE, 

WILLIAM  E.  MORRIS,  SAMUEL  A.  ROLLO, 

GEORGE  HALL,  BERTRAM  H.  HOWELL,  and 

ALFRED  G.  BENSON. 

Treasurer  and  Secretary 
JAS.  S.  WYOKOFF. 


PROSPECTUS, 


The  American  Guano  Company  is  organized 
under  certain  articles  of  agreement  and  asso- 
ciation, dated  New  York,  the  first  day  of  Sep- 
tember, 1855. 

THIS  Company  own  an  island  in  the  Pacific  Ocean, 
covered  with  a  deposit  of  more  than  two  hundred 
million  tons  of  ammoniated  guano,  and  'have  de- 
spatched a  ship,  agent,  and  men,  to  maintain  possession 
thereof.  The  capital  stock  of  said  company  is  tenV; 
millions  of  dollars,  and  is  represented  by  one  hundred/f 
thousand  shares,  at  one  hundred  dollars  a  share.  Sixty 
thousand  shares  of  said  stock  have  been  expended 
to  purchase  the  island,  and  to  despatch  the  ship  before 
mentioned ;  and  forty  thousand  shares  are  appropriated 
as  the  working  capital  of  the  Company,  and  are  placed 
in  the  hands  of  Trustees  to  be  sold  for  the  further  pro- 
motion of  the  enterprise. 


6y£*.<^ 
88934.3 


The  Trustees  now  offer  for  sale  twenty  thousand 
shares  of  this  stock,  at  ten  dollars  ($10)  per  share,  on 
terms  made  known  at  the  office  of  the  Company. 

The  island  is  described  by  the  discoverer  as  follows : 

"  Its  size  is  about  eight  miles  long,  by  four  miles 
broad.  Its  shape  is  crescent,  and  is  quite  low  and  level. 
It  has  a  very  good  harbor  on  the  westerly  side,  where 
fifty  to  one  hundred  ships  of  the  largest  class  can  safely 
lie  and  load  within  fifty  feet  of  the  shore.  Its  forma- 
tion is  coral,  and  it  is  covered  with  a  deposit,  from 
ten  to  thirty  feet  deep,  the  surface  of  which  presents 
a  lightish  crust  in  some  places,  and  porous  in  others. 
There  being  found  thereon  no  trace  of  tree,  shrub,  or 
verdure  of  any  sort,  said  deposit  cannot  have  arisen 
from  any  vegetable  substance ;  while  the  innumerable 
multitude  of  birds  found  there,  coupled  with  the 
pungent  smell  evolved  from  their  ordure,  its  color, 
its  ashy,  impalpable  nature,  its  location  in  a  dry  and 
warm  latitude,  one  and  all  unite  to  confirm  the  convic- 
tion that  said  deposit  can  fce  nothing  but  one  vast  bed 
of  ammoniated  guano." 

Excepting  this  one,  no  Guano  Island  hitherto  dis- 
covered possesses  the  natural  advantages  of  a  good 
harbor,  safe  anchorage,  and  conveniences  to  load  a 
large  number  of  ships  at  once. 

At  the  Chincha  Islands  there  is  no  harbor,  and  one 
vessel  only  can  load  at  a  time  under  the  Manguera 
(though  lately  some  have  loaded  in  launches),  and  yet 
there  were  exported  from  that  place  over  four  hun- 
dred thousand  tons  of  guano  during  the  past  year. 

From  the  past  and  present  demand  for  Peruvian 


guano,  now  selling  at  fifty-five  dollars  per  ton,  it  is  safe 
to  presume  that  there  will  be  no  difficulty  when  under 
a  full  and  complete  business  organization,  in  disposing 
of  at  least  two  million  tons  per  annum,  at  thirty  dol- 
lars per  ton  from  the  island  belonging  to  this  Company, 
because  they  can  load  ten  ships  in  the  time  one  is  load- 
ed at  the  Chincha  Islands,  but  not  to  appear  extrava- 
gant, it  is  proposed  to  estimate  the  sales  of  this  com- 
pany the  first  year  after  being  in  full  operation  at  only 
four  hundred  thousand  tons,  which  sold  at  thirty  (not 
fifty-five)  dollars  a  ton,  presents  the  following  result : 

400,000  tons  at  $30  per  ton,  is,  -         $12,000,000 
Shipping  expenses  per  ton,  -     $2  00 
Freight,  -        -         "     "      -     18  00 
Insurance,       -        "     "  30 


Commission  on  sale  and  in-  i 


.     .      I 

And  storage,       -        -        -      2  00 


cidental  expenses, 


$24  00 9,600,000 

Leaving  a  profit  for  dividend  of  $2,400,000 

In  case  the  Government  of  the  United  States,  or 
any  other  government,  should  purchase  the  said  island 
and  pay  for  the  same,  a  fixed  sum  in  cash  or  govern- 
ment stock — or  agree  to  pay  a  specified  sum  per  ton  as 
the  guano  should  be  mined  and  shipped — then  in  the 
former  case  a  final  dividend  would  be  made  pro  rata  to 
the  Stockholders,  and  the  concern  wound  up ;  or  in 
the  latter  case  dividends  would  be  made  from  time  to 
time  until  the  entire  deposit  shall  have  been  exhausted. 


THE  ANNEXED  EXTRACTS 

SHOW    THE    GREAT    IMPORTANCE    ATTACHED     TO     THIS 
SUBJECT. 


The  following  Preamble  and  Kesolutions  were  una- 
nimously adopted  on  the  22d  June,  1855,  at  the  regular 
meeting  of  the  Farmers'  Club  of  the  American  Insti- 
tute, of  the  City  of  New  York,  held  at  the  Repository, 
No.  531  Broadway : 

WHEREAS  the  Peruvian  Government  has  monopolized 
the  supply  of  Guano  throughout  the  United  States ;  and 

WflEREas,  on  account  of  said  monopoly,  the  Farmers  of 
this  country  have  heretofore  been  obliged  to  pay  for  said 
article  about  $50  a  ton,  and  by  a  recent  announcement  of 
that  Government  there  is  no^prospect  hereafter  of  any  re- 
duction, and 

WHEREAS  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  islands  contain- 
ing large  and  valuable  deposits  of  ammoniated  guano  have 
recently  been  discovered  by  citizens  of  the  United  States, 
who  have  made  application  to  the  Government  at  Wash- 
ington for  protection  therein ;  and 

WHEREAS,  if  said  protection  shall  be  afforded,  the  Farm- 
ers of  this  country  will  reap  the  benefit  of  said  fertilizer  at 
an  advance  of  but  $1  on  the  freight  of  the  same  to  our 
shores,  instead  of  an  onerous  tax  of  more  than  $25  per  ton 
now  paid  Peru ;  therefore, 

RESOLVED,  That  it  is  the  duty  of  the  American  Govern- 


ment  to  assert  its  sovereignty  over  any  and  all  barren  and 
uninhabitable  guano  islands  of  the  ocean  which  have  been 
or  hereafter  may  be  discovered  by  citizens  of  the  United 
States,  and  which  are  situated  so  far  from  any  continent 
that,  according  to  the  laws  which  govern  nations,  no  other 
power  can  rightfully  exercise  jurisdiction  over  them,  and 
to  guarantee  the  right  of  property  therein  to  the  discoverer, 
his  successors  or  assigns, 

RESOLVED,  That  the  Agricultural  Societies  of  the  several 
States  be  invited  to  concur  in  the  foregoing,  and  to  unite 
in  calling  upon  our  Government  at  Washington  and  the 
distinguished  public  men  now  before  the  country,  for  their 
views  on  this  important  question. 

RESOLVED,  That  Bread  being  the  staff  of  life,  its  abund- 
ance furnishes  the  basis  of  national  prosperity. 

RESOLVED,  That  the  foregoing  resolutions  be  printed  in 
the  form  of  a  circular,  signed  by  the  President  and  Secre- 
tary, and  transmitted  to  the  County  and  State  Agricultural 
Societies  of  the  several  States,  to  the  President  of  the 
United  States,  and  heads  of  departments  at  Washington. 

ROBERT  S.  LIVINGSTON,   Chairman. 
HENRY  MEIGS,  Secretary. 


8 


A    LATE    WRITER    SAYS  : 

"  The  commercial  enterprise  of  our  country  is  seek- 
ing out  and  bringing  the  treasures  of  the  waters  to  our 
farms  and  orchards,  in  the  form  of  guano — perhaps  the 
antediluvian  remains  of  the  countless  myriads  that  lived 
before  the  flood.  Treasures,  indeed — rich  in  the  one 
needful  thing,  without  which  our  labor  would  be  vain, 
our  fertile  soils  a  barren  waste." 

"  The  real  and  only  value  of  all  manures,  be  they 
bones,  guano,  or  barn-yard  manure,  ashes  or  city 
sweepings,  can  be  easily  estimated,  by  the  percentage 
of  ingredients  they  contain,  which  the  atmosphere  or  soil 
do  not  furnish  of  themselves ;  by  the  quantity  of  sub- 
stances which  the  land  wants,  and  not  by  the  quantity 
it  does  not  want,  or  which  it  does  not  receive  gratui- 
tously from  the  atmosphere  above  it,  the  cost  of  labor 
necessary  to  transport  the  manure  to  the  land,  and  to 
make  it  available." 

FROM    A    REPORT    OJT    GUANO,    BY    DR.    URE  : 

"Guano,  therefore,  is  found  to  contain  such  sub- 
stances, in  such  proportions,  as  to  surpass  very  far  all 
other  species  of  manure,  whether  natural  or  artificial, 
both  in  the  permanency  of  its  action  upon  the  roots  of 
plants,  and  also  in  giving  immediate  vigor  to  vegetation." 

PROFESSOR    LIEBIG    BELIEVES  : 

"  That  the  importation  of  one  hundredweight  of 
guano  is  equivalent  to  the  importation  of  eight  hun- 
dredweight of  wheat ;  so  that  one  hundredweight  of 
guano  assumes,  with  due  culture,  the  form  of  eight 
hundredweight  of  substantial  food  for  man." 


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